truth with all her heart, and despising whatever was underhand and disloyal, had but one course to take--she must break off her engagement with a man so far below her standard of simple morality. She could not trust his honour, and what security has love in a heart without honour?

So she looked anxiously at Annie as she entered, and Annie would not keep her in suspense. "There was a letter from Miss Moran last night," she said. "She loves George yet. She re-wrote the unfortunate letter, and this time it found its owner. I think he has it next his heart at this very moment."

"I am glad of that, Annie. But who has the first letter?"

"I think you know, Mary."

"You mean Mr. Van Ariens?"

"Yes."

"Then there is no more to be said. I shall write to him as soon as possible."

"I am sorry--"

"No, no! Be content, Annie. The right must always come right. Neither you nor I could desire any other end, even to our own love story."

"But you must suffer."

"Not much. None of us weep if we lose what is of no value. And I have noticed that the happiness of any one is always conditioned by the unhappiness of some one else. Love usually builds his home out of the wrecks of other homes. Your cousin and Cornelia will be happy, but there are others that must suffer, that they may be so. I will go now, Annie, because until I have written to Mr. Van Ariens, I shall not feel free. And also, I do not wish him to come here, and in his last letter he spoke of such an intention."

So the two letters--that of Hyde to Cornelia, and that of Mary Darner to Van Ariens, left England for America in the same packet; and though Mary Darner undoubtedly had some suffering and disappointment to conquer, the fight was all within her. To her friends at the Manor she was just the same bright, courageous girl; ready for every emergency, and equally ready to make the most of every pleasure.

And the tone of the Manor House was now set to a key of the highest joy and expectation. Hyde unconsciously struck the note, for he was happily busy from morning to night about affairs relating either to his marriage, or to his future as the head of a great household. All his old exigent, extravagant liking for rich clothing returned to him. He had constant visits from his London tailor, a dapper little artist, who brought with him a profusion of rich cloth, silk and satin, and who firmly believed that the tailor made the man. There were also endless interviews with the family lawyer, endless readings of law papers, and endless consultations about rights and successions, which Hyde was glad and grateful to leave very much to his father's wisdom and generosity.

At the beginning of this happy period, Hyde had been sure that the business of his preparations would be arranged in three weeks; a month had appeared to be a quite unreasonable and impossible delay; but the month passed, and it was nearly the middle of November when all things were ready for his voyage. His mother would then have urged a postponement until spring, but she knew that George would brook no further delay; and she was wise enough to accept the inevitable cheerfully. And thus by letting her will lead her, in the very road necessity drove her, she preserved not only her liberty, but her desire.

Some of these last days were occupied in selecting from her jewels presents for Cornelia, with webs of gold and silver tissues, and Spitalfields silks so rich and heavy, that no mortal woman might hope to outwear them. To these Annie added from her own store of lace, many very valuable pieces; and the happy bridegroom was proud to see that love was going to send him away, with both arms full for the beloved.

The best gift however came last, and it was from the Earl. It was not gold or land, though he gave generously of both these; but one which Hyde felt made his way straight before him, and which he knew must have cost his father much self-abnegation. It was the following letter to Dr. John Moran.

MY DEAR SIR:

It seems then, that our dear children love each other so well, that it is beyond our right, even as parents, to forbid their marriage. I ask from you, for my son, who is a humble and ardent suitor for Miss Moran's hand, all the favour his sincere devotion to her deserves, We have both been young, we have both loved, accept then his affection as some atonement for any grievance or injustice you remember against myself. Had we known each other better, we should doubtless have loved each other better; but now that marriage will make us kin, I offer you my hand, with all it implies of regret for the past, and of respect for the future. Your servant to command,

RICHARD HYDE.

"It is the greatest proof of my love I can give you, George," said the Earl, when the letter had been read; "and it is Annie you must thank for it. She dropped the thought into my heart, and if the thought has silently grown to these written words, it is because she had put many other good thoughts there, and that these helped this one to come to perfection."

"Have you noticed, father, how small and fragile-looking she is? Can she really be slowly dying?"

"No, she is not dying; she is only going a little further away--a little further away, every hour. Some hour she will be called, and she will answer, and we shall see her no more--HERE. But I do not call that dying, and if it be dying, Annie will go as calmly and simply, as if she were fulfilling some religious rite or duty. She loves God, and she will go to Him."

The next morning Hyde left his father's home forever. It was impossible that such a parting should be happy. No hopes, no dreams of future joy, could make him forget the wealth of love he was leaving. Nor did he wish to forget. And woe to the man or woman who would buy composure and contentment by forgetting!--by really forfeiting a portion of their existence--by being a suicide of their own moral nature.

The day was a black winter day, with a monotonous rain and a dark sky troubled by a ghostly wind. Inside the house the silence fell on the heart like a weight. The Earl and Countess watched their son's carriage turn from the door, and then looked silently into each other's face. The Earl's lips were firmly set, and his eyes full of tears; the Countess was weeping bitterly. He went with her to her room, and with all his old charm and tenderness comforted her for her great loss.

At that moment Annie was forgotten, yet no one was suffering more than she was. Hyde had knelt by her sofa, and taken her in his arms, and covered her face with tears and kisses, and she had not been able to oppose a parting so heart-breaking and so final. The last tears she was ever to shed dropped from her closed eyes, as she listened to his departing steps; and the roll of the carriage carrying him away forever, seemed to roll over her shrinking heart. She cried out feebly--a pitiful little shrill cry, that she hushed with a sob still more full of anguish. Then she began to cast over her suffering soul the balm of prayer, and prostrate with closed eyes, and hands feebly hanging down, Doctor Roslyn found her. He did not need to ask a question, he had long known the brave self-sacrifice that was consecrating the child-heart suffering so sharply that day; and he said only--

"We are made perfect through suffering, Annie."

"I know, dear father."

"And you have found before this, that the sorrow well borne is full of strange joys--joys, whose long lasting perfumes, show that they were grown in heaven and not on earth."

"This is the last sorrow that can come to me, father."

"And my dear Annie, you would have been a loser without it. Every grief has its meaning, and the web of life could not be better woven, if only love touched it."

"I have been praying, father."

"Nay, but God Himself prayed in you, while your soul waited in deep resignation. God gave you both the resignation and the answer."

"My heart failed me at the last--then I prayed as well as I could."

"And then, visited by the NOT YOURSELF in you, your head was lifted up. Do not be frightened at what you want. Strive for it little by little. All that is bitter in outward things, or in interior things, all that befalls you in the course of a day, is YOUR DAILY BREAD if you will take it from His hand."

Then she was silent and quite still, and he sat and watched the gradual lifting of the spirit's cloud--watched, until the pallor of her face grew luminous with the inner light, and her wide open eyes saw, as in a vision, things, invisible to mortal sight; but open to the spirit on that dazzling line where mortal and immortal verge.

And as he went home, stepping slowly through the misty world, he himself hardly knew whether he was in the body or out of it. He felt not the dripping rain, he was not conscious of the encompassing earthly vapours, he had passed within the veil and was worshipping

"In dazzling temples opened straight to Him, Where One who had great lightnings for His crown Was suddenly made present; vast and dim Through crowded pinions of the Cherubim."

And his feet stumbled not, nor was he aware of anything around, until the Earl met him at the park gates and touching him said reverently--

"Father, you are close to the highway. Have you seen Annie?"

"I have just left her."

"She is further from us than ever."

"Richard Hyde," he answered," she is on her way to God, and she can rest nothing short of that."

CHAPTER XIV